The media portrayal of the riots as all because of a few gangs of criminal teens is annoying me. It's not only teens, it's not all about thieving. Britain's problems go deeper than that.
It's the result of the Conservative / Liberal Democrat coalition government's ideology of systematically punishing the unemployed, the young, the poor and the vulnerable for daring to need assistance in the middle of the worst economic downturn since the 80s, and for daring to want a fair share of the wealth in one of the richest and most socially-unequal countries in the world, with the worst social mobility in the developed world, and youth unemployment rates at 1-in-5 overall, and worse than that for minorities, disabled, and youngsters from poorer backgrounds.
Really, this is not a surprise. Social inequality and lack of social mobility leads to frustration, envy, disenchantment and loss of hope in individuals and whole communities. Of course the demonisation of the poor, the vulnerable, the disabled, the elderly, the young, and the various minority groups that this government has engaged in has consequences. You can't scapegoat and disenfranchise whole groups of people without consequences.
The government and the media have systematically told people that they're the problem, that they're lazy, workshy, to blame for all society's ills, that they don't deserve help, and that the government will be taking the help they do get away from them -- all in order to divert attention from tax breaks for the rich and big businesses -- and eventually, people believed them: believed that they're not part of society, that the government won't help them. That if they need any help, they'll have to help themselves.
There's no possibility of turning to the Conservatives for help, since they've set these policies, and the Liberal Democrats are mostly agreeing with Tory policies since they're part of the Coalition. There's less and less possibility of peaceful political protest, since that's increasingly illegal. The Unions are trying to protest, but they're little use to people who are unemployed and have no hope of gaining any decent employment. The Labour party is led by yet another rich white male
[ETA: Yinkawills pointed out that 'Red' Ed Miliband isn't an ex-public-shoolboy, but went to a state school. I think my point still stands, though: just like Cameron, he went to Oxford to study PPE, then went on to the LSE. He became a journalist in London, then went straight into the Labour party political machine, becoming a member of the elite class of professional career politicians. Now he's as trapped in the Westminster bubble as any Tory. He's not the right sort of person to stand up to the Tories, IMO, because he has too much in common with them.]
Social inequality with no hope of improvement, with every chance of getting worse, leads to a breakdown of the social contract. People who get nothing decent from the state and are labelled as 'beyond normal society' by politicians and the media have nothing to lose. That inevitably leads to a breakdown of the rule of law, because why would you obey the law and respect the state if the law and the state do not protect and respect you?
